child welfare

child welfare,

services provided for the care of disadvantaged children. Foundling institutions for orphans and abandoned children were the earliest attempts at child care, usually under religious auspices. At first the goal was to provide minimum physical subsistence, but services have been expanded to include social and psychological help. In the late 18th cent., a movement developed around the idea that children should not simply be regarded as small adults, and such educators as Rousseau, Pestalozzi, and Froebel were discussing children's special needs at the same time that the Industrial Revolution intensified the nonagricultural exploitation of child laborchild labor,use of the young as workers in factories, farms, and mines. Child labor was first recognized as a social problem with the introduction of the factory system in late 18th-century Great Britain......Click the link for more information.. In the 19th cent. many religious and private institutions were organized to take care of children who were orphaned, destitute, or handicapped. In child-welfare legislation, the British Children's Charter Act of 1908 and the Ohio Children's Code Commission of 1911 marked a new era. The idea that it was the responsibility of the community to provide children with the advantages that their parents could not supply is a 20th-century development. In this category are free school lunches; medical, dental, and psychiatric services and child guidance clinics in schools; playgrounds; children's courts; special schools for handicapped children; and care in foster families for children of broken homes. Infant and child clinics are often provided by municipalities. Many social welfaresocial welfareor public charity,organized provision of educational, cultural, medical, and financial assistance to the needy. Modern social welfare measures may include any of the following: the care of destitute adults; the treatment of the mentally ill; the.....Click the link for more information. agencies finance summer camps for both healthy and handicapped children. In the United States child welfare services are administered through the Administration for Children and Families within the U.S. Dept. of Health and Human Services. A series of new child welfare programs were passed by Congress in the 1960s. These included the Child Nutrition Act, the Head Start Program, and the Foster Grandparent Program. The International Union for Child Welfare (1920) organized relief for child victims of major international and national disasters. The United Nations Children's FundUnited Nations Children's Fund(UNICEF), a specialized fund of the United Nations. It was established in 1946 as the United Nations International Children's Emergency Fund, and became a permanent part of the United Nations in 1953, when it acquired its current name (but retained.....Click the link for more information. (UNICEF, 1946) targets malnutrition and helps reestablish children's services destroyed in war. Current child welfare concerns include child abusechild abuse,physical, sexual, or emotional maltreatment or neglect of children by parents, guardians, or others responsible for a child's welfare. Physical abuse is characterized by physical injury, usually inflicted as a result of a beating or inappropriately harsh discipline......Click the link for more information. and child care (see day nurseryday nursery,day-care center,or crèche, institution for the care of the children of working parents. Originating in Europe in the late 18th and early 19th cent......Click the link for more information.).

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